Groan… As much as I hate to agree_with/be_like Trey Parker and Matt Stone (“We have opinions! Listen to our opinions!”), when is the world going to get the memo that Michael Bay is a terrible, terrible director? Yes, he does some amazing action sequences, but that doesn’t make a movie.

I mean, The Island? I can’t even begin to get into how bad that was, but I do know that it was no one’s fault more than his (definitely not Scarlett Johansson’s fault; nobody try to tell me anything bad about her).

I almost hope Transformers is so bad that maybe he’ll stop directing movies (although if Armageddon, Pearl Harbor, and The Island couldn’t stop him, I suspect nothing will); I’m sure he could have a nice career as a special effects coordinator or something.

Anyway, now that my rant is over, we can get to important questions, such as: why would a robot built by an arcane outer space intelligence take the form of a humanoid that then transforms into a boombox or a stegosaurus? Of course, the most important point is that dude, it’s a robot that transforms into a stegosaurus so shut up, but apart from that I have always wondered.

According to Transformers lore, the ship that carried the refugee Autobots — THE ARK — knew they would need local camouflage, so it scanned the local environs for ‘native species.’ It identified these as, you know, trucks and jets and stuff — and reconfigured the Transformers’ shape-shifting abilities to match.

As for the humanoid part, it’s because only humanoids can hold swords and missile launchers that shoot little plastic missiles.

Ah… so what you’re telling me is that I don’t know what I’m talking about. Funny, I guess I didn’t really watch the cartoon or read the comic much, but I still consider myself a major fan. It’s hard for me to imagine a cartoon or comic that could match the inherent coolness of the original toys, which is in a way a paraphrase of my last sentence above.

That underscore innovation happened right here in real time. Make sure that you cite me if you use it because I am sure that no one has ever come up with it before and actually I am filing my patent application tomorrow so you will have to pay me too.

Their creation was sort of happenstance. One particular day at Autobot Headquarters, the Autobots detected unusual seismic activity from within the walls of the cave. Ironhide investigated the disturbance and found that, while inconsequential, he detected very large forms within a hidden cavern. They turned out to be the fossilized bones of dinosaurs. Wheeljack made the suggestion that, because of their brute force and power, dinosaurs working for the Autobots would shake up the Decepticons. Ratchet agreed, suggesting robotic forms and Optimus Prime authorized the project.